Supreme Court gives provinces say over aspects of reproductive law

Reproductive law across Canada risks becoming a patchwork quilt, with significant differences from province to province, after the Supreme Court of Canada ruled unconstitutional several sections of the federal government’s assisted human reproduction act.

In an advisory judgment Wednesday, the court ruled that several sections of the law fall under provincial – not federal – jurisdiction. However, many of the law’s most contentious moral issues such as paying for eggs or how reproductive material can be manipulated, fall under federal law and remain in effect.

In a complicated ruling that risks reopening the politically sensitive dossier of assisted human reproduction, it will now fall to each province to adopt regulations to replace some of the sections the court found unconstitutional.

The ruling also calls into question the role of the federal agency set up to govern assisted human reproduction, since many of the areas it was supposed to oversee are areas the court says fall under provincial jurisdiction.